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My point in the last part of my post was that people do martial arts for many different reasons, not always self-defense or combat effectiveness. Does that make them less of a martial artist because their techniques are not as "effective", I don't think so. Instead, I would stand by my thoughts that they are simply doing a different budo, finding a way to end conflict without the fight.

Also, effectiveness is based on the person who might be involved and their motivation. A drunk doesn't motivate me the same way a person threatening my family does or the way a person with a knife to my throat does. I am a pacifist but I will do what I have to do to survive. In the dojo, the only way to learn effective techniques.....you have to practice. You run through a lot of uke if there are no rules. Makes for a very small dojo too. So, practice for combat effectiveness must be and ever increasing process of realism until you can develop the skills and confidence to deal with any situation you might face.

The earlier question about the undulation or wave motion in Yoseikan is a good one. Shihan Mochizuki is quick to point out he did not invent the wave, he discovered its presence in all of the martial arts. The way I describe it to my students is using the idea of popping someone with a towel. If you don't pull back slightly at the end, you get no pop, pull back slightly as the towel's tip is almost extended and you accelerate the tip of the towel.

This is the same for the punch, this slight pull back while the fist is still going forward gives tremendous acceleration and focuses the energy in a tighter pattern. It applies with a katana, a bo, a kick, a throw, even a joint lock. And, it can be a long wave, short wave or even a pulse of energy depending on how you control the movements.

Oh no, the wave theory is the work of Hiroo Mochizuki and has nothing to do with Auge Sensei or the Seifukai instructors. Shihan Mochizuki developed this idea many years ago. Honestly, the reason those two groups do not do it is that they refuse to communicate with Shihan Mochizuki and have absolutely not relationship, at this point in time, with Yoseikan Budo.

I have always wanted to find out what this "wave" was. I was thinking of buying Hiroo's DVDs to see if he explained it.

You are correct, it sounds just like the snap of the hip used shotokan, or in Aikido, just expressed at the hand, as in other arts.

To be technical, the "wave" would actually increase the moment transferred and increase the impulse of the strike (etc). Please note that I am not trying to be facetious, just stating the correct terms.

When a car crashes into a stationary one, and it moves, this is a transfer of momentum. When an air bag inflates to slow you impact with the dash or steering wheel, this is a decrease in impulse.

Its not easy to master. Roy tried to teach me the wave but he admits he struggles to do it. This could be due to his years of training in traditional karate.

The wave is different to the snap used in shotokan karate. In karate only your hips move. I think with the wave you use your whole body starting with your feet. A good example is throwing a ball or doing shot put or doing Yoseikan Budo (best example)

Oh no, the wave theory is the work of Hiroo Mochizuki and has nothing to do with Auge Sensei or the Seifukai instructors. Shihan Mochizuki developed this idea many years ago. Honestly, the reason those two groups do not do it is that they refuse to communicate with Shihan Mochizuki and have absolutely not relationship, at this point in time, with Yoseikan Budo.

Hows Roy doing? I haven't spoken with him for a while. I hope he expands to an area closer to me. Would love to get back into doing YWF one day.

My point in the last part of my post was that people do martial arts for many different reasons, not always self-defense or combat effectiveness. Does that make them less of a martial artist because their techniques are not as "effective", I don't think so. Instead, I would stand by my thoughts that they are simply doing a different budo, finding a way to end conflict without the fight.

Hello phil

Well as long as you call it a vector for the omoto religion or you say to people it is martial art but that does not really work in that format should you be in need it.
It is fine by me.

Quote:

Phil Farmer wrote:

Also, effectiveness is based on the person who might be involved and their motivation. A drunk doesn't motivate me the same way a person threatening my family does or the way a person with a knife to my throat does. I am a pacifist but I will do what I have to do to survive. In the dojo, the only way to learn effective techniques.....you have to practice. You run through a lot of uke if there are no rules. Makes for a very small dojo too. So, practice for combat effectiveness must be and ever increasing process of realism until you can develop the skills and confidence to deal with any situation you might face.
Phil Farmer

That is one way of looking at it.

There is way to train with intensity without breaking an inordinate amount of uke, but well there is a disclaimer that it is between consenting and responsible adults and no children or animal were hurt or inconvenienced in the making of the movie.

I do not think we can train as full on as MMA guys , not that I am in aikido because all the places were booked on the knitting course either, and MMA have some very good training principles.
Nonetheless Dan and Roman made some valid points, as did William, and I can see where the discrepancy is between what Romam and Dan see as aikido and what William and myself practice.
Personally I blame the lets call every thing budo/martial arts. If there is no practical application, it should not be called martial. There is enough unused Greco Latin gods names to suit anyone fancy.

This has nothing to do with aikikai, takemusu, tomeki, ki yoshinkan, Yoseikan or aikibudo, there is good and bad in every style.

phil (bis)

One Ringeck to bring them all and in darkness bind them,
In the Land of Windsor where phlip phlop live.

Phil: I refer to what you are discussing as a kinetic chain. As all the parts enter the chain you get the towel snapping or dissipation of power at the end of the chain. Nolan Ryan had a great motion to his deliver that allowed him to throw very hard well into his forties-good kinetic chain of events.

Phil: I refer to what you are discussing as a kinetic chain. As all the parts enter the chain you get the towel snapping or dissipation of power at the end of the chain. Nolan Ryan had a great motion to his deliver that allowed him to throw very hard well into his forties-good kinetic chain of events.

The wave is one of the best models for inyo integration in training. Saito-lineage weapons training uses a vibratory sensation at the conclusion of strikes similar to that seen in tekubi furi undo, which is very much in line with what Mochizuki discusses, and more widely done.

Wow, how did this get to be its own thread? I don't mind, but boy was I surprised. I do agree with John (hello by the way) that the analogy of a pitch is a good one and is actually the first movement in the Yoseikan Budo kata tanto happo.

I would disagree a bit that it is like the shotokan hip movement, though it can and does develop from that good hip snap, it is the slight pull back of the hips at the end that accelarates the fist (foot, weapon, etc). Darin has it correct, the feet are key but not necessary as Mitchi Mochizuki has demonstrated the same movement while leaping into the air. Course, if I had spent my entire life doing it, I could probably do the same (yeah right!).

As to the issue of budo, I am sorry but I cannot catagorize aikido into the omote issue. Yes, O Sensei certainly included that in his aikido but, that would cover every martial way. At some level, it is a spiritual experience and expression of oneself, or one's beliefs, or one's emotions. It is why, after all, we each chose the path we did. And, an important reminder, "do" is the path, regardless of what words go before it. The Yoseikan emblem has a mountain, that represents all martial arts. Minoru Sensei often told students that this mountain had many paths to the top, but the goal was to arrive at the top. The emblem also always extends slightly beyond the circle around it because, as Shihan Mochizuki explains, there are no perfect techniques.

Oh, lastly, thanks to all for your willingness to discuss Yoseikan. I am also saddened by some of the splits that have occurred over recent years in the art. On the horizon is a possible solution for many of those who did not make the shift over to Yoseikan Budo. Shihan is working on the idea of developing Aikido Mochizuki, Karate Mochizuki, Judo Mochizuki, etc. for those who do not want to work on all aspects of Yoseikan budo. There are many paths after all.

I do not think we can train as full on as MMA guys , not that I am in aikido because all the places were booked on the knitting course either, and MMA have some very good training principles.
Nonetheless Dan and Roman made some valid points, as did William, and I can see where the discrepancy is between what Romam and Dan see as aikido and what William and myself practice.

Perhaps knitting is best in that it's truly peaceful and can never give any illusions as to how it applies in other contexts of real life.

I wouldn't presume to define what Aikido is, it's easier to isolate and discuss portions of "Martial Truth" than try to pin it all down in a concise fashion. Besides, you get criticized as a know-it-all or wannabe savior if you dare express your thoughts on a discussion board made for expressing just those sorts of thoughts. I do think that making progress up any path of the mountain requires gaining actual as opposed to imaginary ability, which translates to ability against increasing levels of intelligent resistance. In the aiki-boxing thread someone posted a link to an interview with Aikikai Shihan Hiroshi Isoyama with the following comment:

"Q. Did you ever talk to your American students about the founder, Morihei Ueshiba?"

"A. Yes. I even took some of them to Iwama to meet him. They couldn’t believe it when they saw me being thrown all over the mat by O-Sensei. They said, “How can someone like you, who can throw all of us so easily, be thrown around like that by an old man?!” I replied, “That’s what I’d like to know!” (laughs) I explained that aikido had nothing to do with one’s age. They asked if they could try holding onto O-Sensei themselves and one of the most lively came up and was downed and pinned the instant he tried. They couldn’t figure out how they’d been controlled like that; they just knew they had."

This is another account of Ueshiba being on another level than his own teacher-students in a way they couldn't really understand. This lends credence to the idea regularly espoused by Rob and Mike Sigman that there is a different way of powering movement, not normally taught, which accounts for such stories. Having read many of those discussions, and then seeing the comment about the Yoseikan movement, it sounds strikingly similar in concept if not in detail. It's worth having that discussion on a separate thread. It seems the Yoseikan founder did not have this skill from Ueshiba, since it's said that his son added this movement to unify the disparate styles. I can't comment on what Rob's teacher Akuzawa does, though I believe the claim is that it is distinctly not a sequential wavelike movement, like throwing a baseball. After all, that would hardly require specialized exercises of the kind Rob talks about. If Rob or Mike Sigman see this thread perhaps they could contribute more, but it's an interesting question where the Yoseikan Budo founder's son learned this movement, and what differences there may be in the Yoseikan world. Playing Devil's Advocate and assuming Rob is correct that only handfuls of people here and there would have knowledge of it, one would expect that only a few in the Yoseikan Budo world would have a solid grasp. However in Yoseikan Budo lore, despite whatever factionalization may exist, there seems to be an explicit awareness that there is supposed to be a specific power method applied to all the techniques, and that said method should be recognizable to Chinese styles as well. In other words it sounds exactly like the things Rob has discussed yet from a completely different source, and the Yoseikan Budo founder's son sounds a lot like Akuzawa from a comparison of their influences and goals. Beyond noticing that there seems to be an obvious parallel, that's all I can say about it, but it would be interesting to know more. For starters, is it known what the Yoseikan source for this movement method is? Where did the founder's son (sorry, can't remember his name) learn it?

... the idea regularly espoused by Rob and Mike Sigman that there is a different way of powering movement, not normally taught, which accounts for such stories. Having read many of those discussions, and then seeing the comment about the Yoseikan movement, it sounds strikingly similar in concept if not in detail.

Dan, I don't think it's that similar. Having met Hiroo Sensei (son of Minoru Mochizuki) and trained with him in the wave movement, I'd say that, at most, there are some parallels with what Rob, Dan, et al have been discussing. But I've never seen anyone in yoseikan do the kinds of things Dan describes or that OSensei demonstrated--the immovability when pushed by several people, the jo trick and things of that nature. In yoseikan, I never saw anyone resist force in that way, but always move with the force to take control of it.

Now, the wave movement seems more a way of generating force than anything related to redirecting the push or power of another person. Hiroo Sensei demonstrates the ability, through his wave motion, to issue percussive power with very little movement. And he can apply this same kind of movement in judo and karate techniques. So I'm sure he has a way of integrating it with the aikido techniques as well. But I don't think it's related to absorbing force while standing on a spot.

Quote:

Dan Austin wrote:

It seems the Yoseikan founder did not have this skill from Ueshiba, since it's said that his son added this movement to unify the disparate styles.

If by "this skill," you mean the "wave" motion, you are correct. That is not something that Minoru Mochizuki got from OSensei. And I wouldn't say so much that Hiroo Sensei "added" the movement to unify disparate styles, but recognized it as the underlying nature of every style. On the aikibudo/yoseikan thread, there is a lot of discussion about Patrick Auge, who was uchi deshi to Minoru Mochizuki. You can see the wave quality in his bokken suburi. Of course, he trained with Hiroo Sensei before he went to Minoru Sensei, so that could be from Hiroo Sensei's influence....

Quote:

Dan Austin wrote:

I can't comment on what Rob's teacher Akuzawa does, though I believe the claim is that it is distinctly not a sequential wavelike movement, like throwing a baseball. After all, that would hardly require specialized exercises of the kind Rob talks about.

Reading the aunkai website closely does not give me the feeling that their practice involves a wave motion. It's a separate matter that you could do even with the aunkai training, in my opinion.

Quote:

Dan Austin wrote:

If Rob or Mike Sigman see this thread perhaps they could contribute more, but it's an interesting question where the Yoseikan Budo founder's son learned this movement, and what differences there may be in the Yoseikan world.

I don't think that Hiroo Sensei "learned" his movement from anyone but gradually came to recognize it from his life experiences. When he went to France, he had been training all his life under a man who was not only uchi deshi to Morihei Ueshiba, but also uchi deshi to Kyuzo Mifune, direct student of Toku Sampo and protege of Jigoro Kano and a master of the Japanese sword. Hiroo Sensei was highly skilled in all these arts as well as Wado Ryu karate before he began teaching in France.

Now, the French cultural experience was very influential in the life and techniques of Minoru Mochizuki, too. It was meeting the many types of fighters in Europe that convinced him that aikido needed to train against a much wider variety of attacks. He and OSensei had quite an argument about this after Mochizuki Sensei returned from France. Mochizuki Sensei had encountered Western fencing, savate, western boxing, knife fighters, knife throwers, and western wrestlers. It was watching the suplex techniques of the wrestlers that he began to regret having lost the opportunity to learn the many sutemi waza of the gyokushin ryu, which lead him to devise many sutemi waza of his own in an effort to recreate that ryu, of which he believed himself the last person to hold a scroll. And that resulted in his yoseikan budo.

But while Minoru Sensei was known as the "founder" of yoseikan budo, it was really Hiroo Sensei who created the term "yoseikan budo." Minoru Sensei had been calling his arts "yoseikan aikido," "yoseikan judo," etc. for some time, but through his son's influence, he began to use the term yoseikan budo to refer to his blended system of aikido, judo, karate, jujutsu and sword. But what Hiroo Sensei had in mind was a different type of blended art.

To begin with, it's important to consider that Hiroo Sensei's approach was very much rooted in Wado Ryu karate while his father's approach was based in judo as much as aikido. And I believe that Hiroo's approach was also heavily influenced by the French culture, leading him into boxing techniques and a generalized grappling also influenced by western wrestling. But with the karate and boxing, you can see the potential for him to discover a wave-like motion inherent in such movements as pitching a baseball. So I think that you could say that his approach came from immersion of his Japanese arts in the French culture, including scientific rationalism and European fighting methods.

Quote:

Dan Austin wrote:

Playing Devil's Advocate and assuming Rob is correct that only handfuls of people here and there would have knowledge of it, one would expect that only a few in the Yoseikan Budo world would have a solid grasp.

Definitely.

Quote:

Dan Austin wrote:

However in Yoseikan Budo lore, despite whatever factionalization may exist, there seems to be an explicit awareness that there is supposed to be a specific power method applied to all the techniques, and that said method should be recognizable to Chinese styles as well.

But it wasn't the same kind of power in Minoru Mochizuki's yoseikan as in Hiroo Mochizuki's. I would say that there is a lot of the traditional power in what Hiroo Sensei does, but the wave thing is a different organizing principle. And further, again, I'd say you could use aunkai-type training and then learn to apply it in that wave fashion, but they are not the same thing as far as I can tell.

Quote:

Dan Austin wrote:

In other words it sounds exactly like the things Rob has discussed yet from a completely different source, and the Yoseikan Budo founder's son sounds a lot like Akuzawa from a comparison of their influences and goals.

I think that's more of an appearance than a real relation.

Quote:

Dan Austin wrote:

...it would be interesting to know more. For starters, is it known what the Yoseikan source for this movement method is? Where did the founder's son (sorry, can't remember his name) learn it?

I hope my comments have helped a little on that question. Of course, the best thing would be to go and see Hiroo Sensei or his son, Mitchi, and see what you think in person.

Best wishes.

David

"That which has no substance can enter where there is no room."
Lao Tzu

Aikido principles simply allow one to redefine, at will, the relative inertial frame initially selected by the attacker, without altering the energy in the system thus defined -- thus the energy either spirals into a hole or out into next to nothingness. Ma-ai is the macro-equivalent of quantized energy, physically constrained by the links of the bodies in operation, simultaneously continuous and discontinuous, and thus either mode of connection can be selected at any time if one begins to perceive the fundamental reality of the interaction.

Quote:

O Sensei wrote:

The Aiki Path is infinite. ...In Aikido you must understand every phenomenon in the universe. For example, the rotation of the Earth and the most intricate and far-reaching system of the universe. ... The technique of Aiki is ascetic training and a way through which you reach a state of unification of body and spirit by the realization of the principle of heaven.

天 理. Angular momentum is the physical principle that ties ALL that together. The old man knew EXACTLY what he was talking physically, put in his own terms.

Aikido principles simply allow one to redefine, at will, the relative inertial frame initially selected by the attacker, without altering the energy in the system thus defined -- thus the energy either spirals into a hole or out into next to nothingness. Ma-ai is the macro-equivalent of quantized energy, physically constrained by the links of the bodies in operation, simultaneously continuous and discontinuous, and thus either mode of connection can be selected at any time if one begins to perceive the fundamental reality of the interaction. 天 理. Angular momentum is the physical principle that ties ALL that together. The old man knew EXACTLY what he was talking physically, put in his own terms.

I think so as well. The similarity seems to be the idea of a unified body skill common even to Chinese arts. The Wikipedia Yoseikan entry claims this is what the Chinese would refer to as "qi", so in that sense it seems the same as what Rob and Mike Sigman say, that there should be a unique underlying mechanical skill that is "qi skill". However I also think that the Yoseikan method sounds quite different than what Rob talks about. Thanks for the detailed history.

Shihan Mochizuki discovered that this wave ( undulation) just kept coming up in all that he was doing. Please remember he was O Sensei's student from 1948 to 1963 when he left for France. I think the best way to describe this movement or principle might be to relate it to the size of the motion. In a large sweeping motion, such as swinging a bo or katana, it is an undualtion feeling (large spaces between the peeks of the wave). This would also apply to the wide movements of aiki or perhaps a good o goshi or a kick. The smaller weapon, a tambo perhaps or a tanto or a punch, the wave peaks are closer together, more in keeping with an actual wave. In the application of a joint lock, a close in punch, a punch say from a prone position or a punch with no time to think about it, you can get very close wave peaks and I think of this as a pulse. Hope this helps a bit, it depends on the setting, weapon, and the timing.

To illustrate, Shihan told a story that he was with O Sensei and they were watching a class at the dojo. O Sensei said to look at the students, the circles are very big, for beginners to get the feel for the motion. Shihan said they had a class for advanced students afterward and the circles were decidedly much smaller and much more powerful. It takes time to learn the wave, it is taught and discussed with all students. The best are of course Shihan and his sons but many other instructors do it and do it well. The power that is generated by this motion is literally exponentially greater, remembering mass times velocity squared. The speed added to the punch, kick or throw is very great. The "secret", though there really is no secret, is that you must be very relaxed until the exact moment of impact. For that reason, only well practiced Yoseikan Budo practitioners generate the great power Shihan does. I have held the punching target for him on more than one occaision and I will assure you, at age 71, the concentrated force he can generate is hard to describe. I would liken it to someone taking a two inch steel pipe and jabbing you with its end, like a tsuki. Even through 8 gi tops folded up to make a nice makiwara, you can easily feel the power and it does leave a nice red mark on your body.

Hiroo Mochizuki sensei says himself that the idea of the undulation first came to him while observing a circus artist, who was doing a whip performance.
A knife was attached at the tip of the whip, and the artist, thanks to his wavy movement, made the blade entered so deeply into the trunk of a tree that it was after very difficult to retire.

H. Mochizuki has been very much impressed by this powerful result, and from then has started to reproduce the artist's body motion at that moment.
Where most people were rather interested in the whip motion itself, Mochizuki has been interested in the body motion at play.

A first book on Yoseikan Budo was later published (I don't remember if it was at the end of the 1970's, or in the beginning of the 80's), with many photos, on this subject, with H. Mochizuki demontrating the undulation principle.
That's for the history.

Hiroo Mochizuki sensei says himself that the idea of the undulation first came to him while observing a circus artist, who was doing a whip performance.
A knife was attached at the tip of the whip, and the artist, thanks to his wavy movement, made the blade entered so deeply into the trunk of a tree that it was after very difficult to retire.

H. Mochizuki has been very much impressed by this powerful result, and from then has started to reproduce the artist's body motion at that moment.
Where most people were rather interested in the whip motion itself, Mochizuki has been interested in the body motion at play.

A first book on Yoseikan Budo was later published (I don't remember if it was at the end of the 1970's, or in the beginning of the 80's), with many photos, on this subject, with H. Mochizuki demontrating the undulation principle.

While as a fundamental principle of nature the subtlety and power in manipulating of angular momentum is freely observable in a variety of contexts to anyone with critical powers of physical observation, the "whip" concept is not a novel observation with Hiroo Mochizuki Sensei in connection with Aikido principles. An uchi-deshi of O Sensei, Terry Dobson in particular, and contemporary to H. Mochizuki, observed much the same thing and used it in his teaching , which has been mentioned in this forum before:

I had the privilege of training with Terry Dobson a lot, and he used a bullwhip to demonstrate several things. The most important thing was the demonstration of leading one's partner by their Ki, instead of pushing them around. .... He then demonstrated the effectiveness of circular and spirallic movements in generating very strong forces. He showed how changing directions dynamically caused the tip of the whip to move so fast that it broke the sound barrier, hence the "crack" of the whip.

It should not be surprising that different observers of talent, looking at the same fundamental truth, come up with the same basic observations. No one gets credit for seeing it first -- you only get dinged if eventually you don't see it, whether in these terms or some other manner of description.

Hiroo Mochizuki sensei says himself that the idea of the undulation first came to him while observing a circus artist, who was doing a whip performance.

A first book on Yoseikan Budo was later published (I don't remember if it was at the end of the 1970's, or in the beginning of the 80's), with many photos, on this subject, with H. Mochizuki demontrating the undulation principle.
That's for the history.

Very interesting, Alain. Thanks for that contribution!

Best to you.

David

"That which has no substance can enter where there is no room."
Lao Tzu

It should not be surprising that different observers of talent, looking at the same fundamental truth, come up with the same basic observations. No one gets credit for seeing it first -- you only get dinged if eventually you don't see it, whether in these terms or some other manner of description.

Also, it's a matter of how far one takes that simple observation and how completely he can recognize it in seemingly unrelated phenomena. Hiroo Mochizuki has developed it to a high and fine degree.

Best to you, too.

David

"That which has no substance can enter where there is no room."
Lao Tzu

Ma-ai is the macro-equivalent of quantized energy, physically constrained by the links of the bodies in operation, simultaneously continuous and discontinuous, and thus either mode of connection can be selected at any time if one begins to perceive the fundamental reality of the interaction.

I agree...I think.

Justin

A secret of internal strength?:
"Let your weight from the crotch area BE in his hands."